Investigation of same-sex desire, heterosexuality, homosexuality, and the regulation of sexual identities across different racial/ethnic and class/regional communities. Focusing on Native American, African American, Latino, Asian American, and international studies, with texts from law, anthropology, history, film, fiction, and theory.
Athena Title
Diversity in LGBTQ Studies
Prerequisite
Third-year student standing or permission of department
Semester Course Offered
Offered fall
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student Learning Outcomes
Students will develop a scholarly framework within which to assess the development of modern gay, lesbian, and bisexual identities.
Students will develop a historical and cross-cultural perspectives to allow them to understand the changing and constructed nature of human sexuality.
Students will develop an intellectual understanding of the debates surrounding the regulation of sexuality in past and
contemporary societies.
Students will develop a more comprehensive knowledge of the diverse and changing meanings attached to sexual identities.
Students will be able to contextualize modern concern with heterosexual and homosexual distinctions and divisions.
Topical Outline
1. Sexual Politics: How do we make sense of (hetero)sexuality? What is so troubling about homosexuality?
2. Identity and Experience: What's homosexuality? What's heterosexuality? Does history matter? Do categories matter?
3. What's "Natural"? What's "Queer"? Cross Cultural and Historical Perspectives on Sexual Identities and Practices: The
examples of past and present Native American and Asian American Communities
4. Queer Narratives: Telling our stories differently? Issues of rejection, community, identification, and family
5. Finding "Family": Loss and (Be)Longing: Making new lives and re/defining social space
6. Regulating Bodies: Homophobia, Law and Politics: What are we up against? Who are "we?" Citizens or outlaws? What strategies are necessary and appropriate for "resistance"?
7. Representation of Queer Otherness: Structures of domination and repression: opportunities for contestation?
8. Articulating Desire/s: How significant are sexual pleasures (and dangers)? How do we know our desires? What has feminism got to do with it?
9. Politics, Activism, Strategies: Out for ourselves? Does theory matter? What is gay and lesbian studies? What are "we"/"they" learning?
